Slow Hands

from: yahoo.com

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmp..._blackwoman_dc

I know someone's going to make the inevitable comment the moviegoers are idiots for seeing the movie but this makes me think of what is wrong with the industry. Misconceptions. I don't really plan on seeing the movie but still an intersting read.

All of Perry's success did not make the once-homeless New Orleans native an obvious sell. Perry's agent Charles King from William Morris Agency had taken the Perry package, including a tape of the play "Diary of a Mad Black Woman," and a script for the film to two other studios before reaching Lions Gate.

"I was done by the time Lions Gate came along," Perry said. "I was frustrated with the studios. I was getting notes. I was being told that black people that go to church don't go to the movies. But Lions Gate stepped up, they saw my vision and I became No. 1 because of their support."

jaeufraser

Well, I don't think anyone thought this film was going to make this much money, Lions Gate included. Hell I bet Tyler Perry is surprised. Remember more than a year ago the Passion was a Christian film nobody thought would make much money, and went on to make bank? I don't think this is Passion redux, cause this ain't giong to make 600 million dollars, but sometimes somethings come completely out of left field and surprise everybody.

Giantrobo

The sad thing is Hollywood and black America are still trying to figure each other out. Just when one thinks the other doesn't "Get them" or that they know what the other wants something like this flys out of left field and everyone's left with shocked looks on their faces.

BigDan

I do think there is too much effort on the part of studio executives to make hard-and-fast rules to live by that end up not really being what does or doesn't drive people to the theater.

I mean, the blanket statement that black people who go to church don't go to the movies is the kind of statement I hear quite often that doesn't seem to have any basis in fact.

It appears that, too often, studio execs take the wrong lessons from movie successes and failures. It's like in the wake of Electra how some said that the failure of that movie meant that moviegoers don't want to see female super-heroes when that is likely not the real reason at all (the fact of the matter is that it's impossible to assign a single reason why a movie fails). Every surprise hit is a surprise because some studio executive believes that moviesgoers don't want something they do want. And every surprise failure comes when studios take the wrong lessons from other successes and failures and produces movies accordingly.

Moviemaking isn't a science, and it's near-impossible to determine why such a mass-market entertainment does or doesn't draw people to the theaters. Trying to boil it down to something like the statements above leads only to more surprise hits and more surprise failures.

Slow Hands

The problem with Elektra and now Constantine is that they rushed out a generic story that doesn't look original nor does it look intersting with an obscure comic to the public to cash in the the superhero hype. As you will probably see with the upcoming Sin City it is possible for obscure comics to be successful as long as they have good stories and some orginality.

PopcornTreeCt

I don't think its really that hard to see what movies are gonna be hits and what are gonna be flops. Elektra and Constantine had flop written on it from the greenlight. Jennifer Garner and Keanu Reeves can't carry movies. A spinoff before a sequel? Anyway, to me its not hard to see what movies will make money and what won't.

DRG

From the trailers this movie looks like a mashup of Waiting to Exhale and Big Momma's House.

scott shelton

MAD BLACK WOMAN had a following under the Hollywood radar. Perry sent a mass e-mail to his fans instructing them to see the film this last weekend with their family, friends, pets... He wanted the film to be number one. It worked. It was more calculated than most of the entertainment outlets are letting on.

This upcoming weekend will be the curiosity crowds, but after that, I don't see this film reaching much higher.

The thing to keep in mind is that if Perry did work with a major, the film would not have come out like it did. He should be thankful Lions Gate stayed off his back. The film IS awful, but you can't deny the audience reaction to it. That was more entertaining than the movie itself.

BigDan

So you wouldn't have greenlighted The Matrix or something like 13 Going on 30 (which, admittedly, was not a big hit with a $57 million gross, though given its cost, it was a modest hit)?

Not to mention that everyone who can open a movie was unknown at one point and just about everyone who can open a movie has had at least one flop.

I don't think it's all that easy (heck, there are finished movies I love that I can't believe grossed as poorly as they did. Being able to predict their failure prior to starting would've been difficult for me. And by the same token, there are terrible movies that grossed very well. I never would've greenlighted the a whole mess of movies I found to have terrible stories/scripts but which made very good money at the box office).

majorjoe23

Constantine is a flop?

iggystar

Have you ever seen one of Tyler Perry's stage plays? They are very well known here in Detroit. I've seen them. I've liked them. I wouldn't have green lit the movie to be made with my money.

The plays are sort of a mashup of a lot of things, very comical, some seriousness, a little bit of a "message"...but the actual stories in my opinion are very thin. There's so much going on, but the main attraction is Medea (played by Perry, in "Big Mama" dress) and mostly you're laughing at the character Medea and her wild antics. While I find Perry's work entertaining I couldn't say that mainstream America would and that's why you green light movies to make money.

But no matter how many formulas Hollywood uses, it's not all that easy to predict what will be a hit.

jaeufraser

Sounds like you're making your argument based on which movies you liked, not actual numbers. Seriously, I doubt Sin City is going to make much more than Constantine is.

Elektra is a flop, but Constantine is not. And Sin City isn't the sure fire blcokbuster some people believe it is. It'll probably end up, box office wise, being like...well...Constantine.

And in truth, hindsight is 20-20. I don't think anyone really thought this would blow up the way it did. And quite frankly, every week there's a film like this, the big difference being they do not blow up like this and make this type of money. This IS much more of a rare occurence, and while I'm sure the studios would love hte foresight to know this would happen, that's hardly an easy thing to do.